Cockrill

The defendants, Cockrill, a lawyer by profession, and Akada, a native of Japan, were indicted by the grand jury of Sonoma County for the crime of conspiring to cause or effect the transfer of real property to an alien ineligible to citizenship under the laws of the United States, in violation of the provisions of an initiative act adopted by the people at the general election held on November 2, 1920 (Stats. 1921, p. Ixxxiii), and designated and known as the “Alien Land Law.”

The defendants demurred to the indictment on general and special grounds and also moved to set it aside for alleged statutory reasons. The motion was disallowed, but the district attorney, conceding the force of the demurrer in a certain particular, was, upon motion, allowed to amend the indictment. Like proceedings were had as to the amended indictment, and, by leave of the court, the district attorney again amended the indictment, and it was upon the second amended indictment that the defendants were finally arraigned, tried for and convicted of the crime above stated.

At the time fixed for the arraignment of the defendants for sentence, the latter, through their counsel, interposed a motion in arrest of…